June 2, 2013

• Xanga

  (Reposted from the Archives, written on the event of my 7-year Xangaversary.)

  In May and June of 2003, I was a substitute teacher at my old high school.  I didn’t have a teaching degree yet–not even my bachelors’–but it was a private school and they were hurting for subs, and I was hurting for the 75 bucks a day they were willing to shell out for me to run glorified study halls.  So I babysat for people only three years younger than myself, and I wore a tie and people called me “Mr. Russo.”

  When they had me sub for a class that was in the computer lab, I let the kids surf the web once their work was done.  At the time, all the high-schoolers had these weird blog-things called Xangas.  Neopets were out, Xangas were in.  A few of them explained the concept to me.  It sounded interesting.

  About a week later my younger sister, who was still in high school, had a big fight with my mom.  I asked what it was about.  It turns out my sister had gotten some sort of account on some sort of website where (my mother was convinced) she had made public all her private information and no doubt had pedophiles and identity thieves swooping down on her.  I asked my sister what it was called, and she said it was called a Xanga.  I made one myself, just to see how it worked, and when I saw that you could easily keep your private information private, I was able to assuage my mother’s technophobia.

  My sister has long since stopped blogging–not that she was ever an avid blogger anyway.  My mother eventually got a Xanga of her own, and held court for a while as lalalalooneylisa, until real life responsibilities ate all her blogging time.  But I am still here.

  When I started this Xanga, you could not reply to comments.  (People would hold conversations by going to the commenter’s site and leaving a return comment that started with “RYC.”)  There were no “Friends,” only subscribers.  There was no inbox, your private home page looked almost the same as your public page with a few extra buttons.  You had to actually go to your subscribed sites to see if they’d updated lately.  There was no Pulse.  XTV hadn’t even been dreamed of.  Blogrings were one of the only ways to meet like-minded people.  Xanga Premium got you the complete editing tools in your weblog editor, as well as the ability to host photos or have more than three profile pics.

  I’ve met friends here–friends who I’ve since attended their wedding and they’ve attended mine.  My wife first met me here, reading my posts before she’d met me in real life.  We broadcasted our wedding live on XangaTV.

  I’ve had as many as six other Xangas.  One was written by a fictional character from a series of short stories I wrote (an immortal Catholic former Crusader who was now a penitent old bookseller in Brooklyn).  One was my evil alter ego.  Two were anonymous, and two were my troll sites that I used to pick fights and rile up those easily riled up and say things that I myself couldn’t say without offending.  But this site here is my oldest, my main, and I always come back to it.  I’ve had it since June 4th, 2003.

  I don’t know what the future of Xanga is.  I don’t know if this steady traffic bleed will ever kill the whole network (and thus rendering my Lifetime Premium useless).  I don’t know if the gradual loss of my favorite bloggers will ever induce me to seek other communities for my creative outlet.  But I do know this: I am so very grateful to all that Xanga has done for me and has been for me.  These seven years have shaped me, both as a person and a writer, and Xanga has played a role in each.  And for that, I thank you, Xanga, plus all the Xangans who have thus poured into my life.

  • 4:14 pm
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